JRT Artistic Director Saul Elkin has announced playwright/author Alice Eve Cohen will attend the opening night of her own play, "What I Thought I Knew", Thursday, February 6, in the Maxine and Robert Seller Theatre at the Jewish Community Center, 2640 North Forest Road, Amherst, NY.
"We are thrilled to welcome Ms. Cohen to our theatre as we present her remarkable play, based on deeply personal events that provide a powerful and exhilarating commentary on the health care system, motherhood and life changing decisions," says Elkin. Opening night audience members will have the opportunity to meet Alice Eve Cohen at the preshow reception (6:30 - 7:20 p.m.) and after the show, when she joins director Saul Elkin and actress Josie DiVincenzo on stage for a theatre talkback.
Winner of the 2019 Jane Chambers Playwriting Award, for "In the Cervix of Others", Cohen's book "What I Thought I Knew" has been widely praised as a "darkly hilarious memoir" and "an unexpected bundle of joy," by Oprah Magazine and called, "Everything we love in a book; profound, honest, hilarious, humane, surprising." by Anne Lamott in Salon.com's Best Books of the Year.
Alice Cohen was happy for the first time in years. After a difficult divorce, she was engaged to a wonderful man, she was raising a beloved adopted daughter; and her career was blossoming. Then she started experiencing mysterious symptoms. After months of tests, X-rays, and hormone treatments, Alice was diagnosed with an abdominal tumor and sent for an emergency CAT scan that revealed the cause of her symptoms. She was six months pregnant. At age 44, with no prenatal care and no insurance coverage for a high-risk pregnancy, Alice was inundated with opinions from doctors and friends telling her what was ethical, what was loving, what was right. With the suspense of a thriller and the intimacy of a diary, Cohen describes her unexpected odyssey through doubt, a broken medical system, and the complexities of motherhood and family in today's world. Ruefully funny, wickedly candid, What I Thought I Knew is a mystery, a love story, a philosophical quest and a personal tour de force.
The Jewish Repertory Theatre of Western New York is a program of the JCC of Greater Buffalo.
For more information on JRT productions, dates and subscriptions, www.jewishrepertorytheatre.com. Box office: 716-650-7626, Showclix: 1-888-718-4253 (Monday-Friday, 9am-9pm EST).
Photo Credit: Kevin S Moul
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